Boulder County won't ask voters for sustainability tax this fall

Edge Contracting workers Gino Pacheco, left, and Ruben Aguirre look at the blueprints while building a dam to re-rout the river to its original path for the Lefthand Water District on March 10 on Lefthand Canyon Drive. Boulder County is considering a tax on the November ballot to fund flood-relief activities. (Jeremy Papasso / Daily Camera)

Boulder County commissioners have decided not to ask county voters' approval of a new "sustainability tax" in this fall's general election.

Boulder County tax proposal polling results

From July 1-10, Talmey-Drake Research and Strategy Inc. of Boulder conducted telephone interviews of 600 active Boulder County voters on questions about items the county commissioners might put on November's ballot. Among the results:

Sustainability tax:

48 percent said they'd vote for a 0.15 percent sales tax, to be collected for 15 years, to fund sustainability programs; 40 percent said they'd vote against such a tax; 11 percent were undecided or unsure; 1 percent refused to answer.

Flood recovery tax:

65 percent of a subset said they'd vote for a 0.15 percent sales tax, to be collected for eight years, to fund county flood recovery expenses; 27 percent said they'd vote against it; 8 percent said they were undecided or unsure.

67 percent of a separate subset said they'd vote for a 0.25 percent flood-recovery sales tax collected for three years; 22 percent would vote against it; 11 percent said they were undecided or unsure.

The Board of County Commissioners may, however, place two other tax questions on the November ballot — a new sales tax that would help fund county government's flood recovery efforts, and an extension of the "safety net" property tax the county now collects annually to help provide housing, child care, and human and health services to needy families.

Commissioners Deb Gardner and Elise Jones announced those decisions during a meeting Thursday morning.

Commissioner Cindy Domenico is vacationing, but her colleagues said they'd been in communication with her about the priorities the board will be pursuing for putting anything on the ballot, and the three explained their rationale in a joint statement published after the meeting.

During the meeting, Jones and Gardner both stressed the commissioners' continuing commitment to environmental sustainability and did not rule out the possibility of asking Boulder County voters in the future to authorize a tax for programs and projects to expand recycling and composting, conserve water, reduce energy consumption and assist farmers in growing more local and organic food.

Recent polling has shown that Boulder County residents are putting a high priority on continuing the county's repair and recovery efforts after last September's floods, the commissioners said.

They said that polling also showed continued support for the 0.9 mill human services safety net property tax, which voters originally approved in 2010, which now generates about $5 million annually and is set to expire in 2015.

Gardner and Jones directed the county staff to prepare three possible tax questions for public hearings scheduled for Aug. 12, the deadline for the county to decide whether to advance anything to the November ballot.

One would ask voters for a 15-year extension of the 0.9 mill safety-net tax.

The other two would be alternative versions of a new flood-recovery tax, although the commissioners would likely advance only one of those two to the ballot, if they decide to proceed.

One of the possible flood-recovery tax proposals would ask voters to allow the county to collect a 0.15 percent sales tax for eight years, generating a projected $30 million over that time to help cover the county's costs for projects and programs to recover from last September's floods and any wildfires — as well as any expenses related to additional flooding, wildfires or other disasters that might occur in that time frame.

The other alternative would be a 0.25 percent flood-recovery sales tax that would be collected over the next three years, raising a total projected $33 million.

Last month, Boulder County District Attorney Stan Garnett said he'd encourage the commissioners to scrap the idea of a sustainability tax and focus on such "real world" issues as the need for a new facility to house less dangerous offenders, for higher salaries for his staff and for a remodeling of his office's outdated quarters.

Boulder County Coroner Emma Hall said last month that compensation is an issue for her staff as well and that she's trying to make do with the same amount of funding for a caseload that's risen from 186 autopsies in 2012 to 244 in 2013.

Jones and Gardner did not mention those sustainability-tax criticisms, but said afterward that no tax question has been under consideration for such purposes.

On Thursday afternoon, Garnett said that the commissioners had made "a wise decision" and that it's appropriate to put a priority on the need for a flood-recovery tax because of the stress the floods have put on the overall Boulder County budget and the other non-flood-related services and projects that budget is supposed to fund.

Garnett said he and his staff are now working on preparing the DA's requests for the 2015 county budget, and that he'll be making his office's needs known to the commissioners and the community at that point.

Garnett also said that "at the right time," when county government's other operating and capital budget needs have been adequately addressed, he looks forward to supporting a sustainability tax proposal.

One of the vocal supporters of the idea of a sustainability tax earlier this year was former Longmont City Councilman Dan Benavidez, a board member of Eco-Cycle, the nonprofit recycling agency.

Last March, Benavidez told the commissioners that such a tax could support a long-needed "Zero Waste" infrastructure for eastern Boulder County, allowing the diversion of as much material as possible from landfills, the establishment of an east county composting facility, and the siting of a location where residents of the area could drop off electronic waste and hard-to-recycle materials.

Benavidez said Thursday that he's disappointed at the commissioners' decision not to put a sustainability tax on this year's ballot, "but the thing that uplifts my spirit is that at least I know they may look at it again in another year. They haven't discounted this for the future."

Former Boulder County Commissioner Will Toor, another advocate of a sustainability tax, said he's disappointed it won't be on the fall ballot, "but I understand the decision."

Toor, who's director of transportation programs for the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project, said the costs of flood recovery have been "substantially higher than originally expected."

Toor said it also appears the federal and state funding reimbursements for parts of that county spending will be slower than had once been thought, and "there's an urgent need to fill that gap for flood recovery" in the meantime.

He said that he hoped the county can find money elsewhere in its existing budget to continue existing sustainability efforts such as the EnergySmart energy conservation program and, when possible, to expand and add to those programs.

In their joint statement after Thursday's meeting, Jones, Gardner and Domenico said: "When we have been able to rebuild our community infrastructure and bring stability to more struggling households, we will once again reach out to our residents and ask for their support in continuing a leadership role in funding a countywide sustainability initiative."

Domenico, the chairwoman of the county board, said in that written statement that it's become clear that "flood recovery, including rebuilding our transportation system, restoring waterways and helping people impacted by the flood will continue to be the focus of ongoing effort for many years."

Jones and Gardner both noted that flood victims are among the Boulder County residents benefiting from some of the assistance programs the county is able to provide with the money being collected from the human-services safety-net property tax.

With that tax in place, "the county was able to get people the help they've needed to get back on their feet following the flood," Gardner said.

Earlier this year, the commissioners had discussed the possibility of asking voters for a 0.15 percent sales tax or a 0.75 mill property tax for sustainability programs

Jones said that based on July 1-10 polling results the county got about voters' reactions to various tax proposals, along with conversations the commissioners have been having with individuals and local leaders, "we will not be taking action to put a sustainability measure onto the ballot this year."

Bob Drake of Talmey-Drake Research Inc. wrote the commissioners last Friday that the poll showed a flood recovery tax would likely pass this fall, no matter which of the two options the county put on the ballot.

However, voters would likely reject a sustainability tax even if it were placed on the same ballot as the more popularly polling flood recovery tax, Drake said.

He said the poll showed that an extension of the safety net tax would likely pass, whether or not it's on the same ballot as the new flood recovery tax.

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